This chapter is from the book

This chapter is from the book

Final Cut Pro's designers have carefully organized the tools you use to configure settings and preferences. The goal of this organization is to make it much easier for editors using the most common hardware and video formats to configure FCP—and much more difficult for users to unintentionally modify individual settings within a preset configuration.

FCP's preset principle is balanced by a highly customizable interface. At the end of this chapter you'll learn about options for reconfiguring Final Cut Pro's interface to complement your personal working preferences.

About Easy Setups, Presets, Settings, and Preferences

Capture, device control, and sequence settings are all organized into preset configurations, and these Audio/Video presets are grouped into master presets called Easy Setups.

Any of these preset configurations are completely customizable, but most FCP users should be able to choose an Easy Setup based on their hardware and video format, specify a scratch disk for media capture on the Scratch tab of the System Settings window, and forget about settings until they change their external hardware.

FCP has made setting up preferences simple, but you still may find that you need to delete your FCP preferences files (or "trash your prefs") to force FCP to restore all your program settings to their default values. You will need to delete three files:

First go to User/Library/Preferences/ and remove the file called com.apple.FinalCutPro.plist.

Then go to User/Library/Preferences/Final Cut Pro User Data/ and remove the other two preferences files, called Final Cut Pro 4.5 Preferences and Final Cut Pro POA Cache.

After deleting the files, relaunch Final Cut Pro with all your external hardware on and connected. You'll see the Choose Setup dialog box. Here's your chance to reset your preferences from scratch.

Easy Setup

An Easy Setup is a master preset configuration of multiple Final Cut Pro settings: presets for a Device Control preset, a Capture preset, a Sequence preset, and Audio/Video Playback settings. Instead of choosing several presets and Video and Audio Playback settings using various tabs, you can make one selection in a single window: Easy Setup. FCP offers several standard Easy Setups, but you also have the option of customizing an Easy Setup.

Any customized setups you create are stored in the Custom Settings folder in the Final Cut Pro Documents folder, which makes your custom setups portable.

Audio/Video settings

FCP's Audio/Video settings have their own preference window, called Audio/Video Settings. That's where you can make detailed adjustments to your Sequence presets, Capture presets, Device Control presets, Video Playback, and Audio Playback settings, should the need arise. Your Audio/Video settings are summarized on the Summary tab. If for some reason you want to modify your underlying basic QuickTime settings, you can access them through the tabs in the Audio/Video Settings window.

User Preferences and System Settings

Unlike the Audio/Video settings, which are largely dictated by your hardware and video format, a preference is a setting that specifies how you want to work with your media in Final Cut Pro. FCP 4 preferences have been divided between two different windows: User Preferences and System Settings. The settings in these windows affect all your Final Cut Pro projects.

Modifying the Settings of an Existing Item

If you change the settings on the Easy Setup, Audio/Video, or Timeline Options tab of the User Preferences window, your change will be reflected in new projects, sequences, or items created after you changed the settings. Here's how and where you modify the settings of a project, sequence, or clip you've already created:

Item Properties:
Control-click the item's icon in the Browser or Timeline, then select Item Properties from the shortcut menu.

Sequence Settings:
Control-click the sequence's icon in the Browser, then select Sequence Settings from the shortcut menu.

Project Properties:
Open the project and then choose Edit > Project Properties.

Accessing preferences and settings

Frequently, Final Cut Pro provides more than one route to access your settings for presets and preferences. For example, you can access the capture preferences from the Capture Presets tab in the Audio/Video Settings window, and also directly in the Log and Capture window by selecting a preset from the Capture/Input pop-up menu located on the Capture Settings tab (Figure 3.2). The list of Capture presets you access directly from the Log and Capture window is labeled Capture/Input, but the preset list is the same, and any changes you make on the Log and Capture window's Capture Settings tab will be reflected on the Audio/Video Settings window's Summary tab (Figure 3.3) and in the Easy Setup window (Figure 3.4).

Figure 3.2 Select a different Capture preset from the Capture/Input pop-up menu located on the Capture Settings tab of the Log and Capture window.

Figure 3.3 Your change is reflected on the Summary tab of the Audio/Video Settings window.

Figure 3.4 You'll also see your Capture preset change in the Easy Setup window. All three windows reference the same set of Capture preferences.

One of the reasons FCP's designers based their configuration scheme on presets is that they wanted to make it easy to completely configure the program settings without having to alter individual settings. And it is easy to get confused. Some settings windows look the same but actually modify different program settings. For example, Sequence presets and Capture presets have separate QuickTime settings options. A mismatch between capture settings and sequence settings makes clips play back poorly when you start to edit them in the Timeline, and a settings mismatch is one of the primary causes of user difficulties with FCP.

So how can you avoid problems and confusion? When you launch Final Cut Pro for the first time after installing it, your answers to the Initial Setup questions determine the settings you see in the Easy Setup, Audio/Video Settings, and User Preferences windows. It's best to start with the default settings, use the recommended Easy Setup, and make changes only if you have a specific problem. If you do make changes, your troubleshooting will be most effective if you make one change at a time.

Finding Additional and Third-Party Presets

Final Cut Pro loaded its default preset files when you installed the program, but you may want to install custom presets for any third-party hardware or software you are using with FCP. Check with the hardware manufacturers; they may have created a custom FCP preset. Having the correct custom preset for your external hardware can make configuring Final Cut Pro a whole lot easier.

To install additional and third-party presets, just copy them into the correct folder. Here is the directory path to that folder: Library/Application Support/Final Cut Pro System Support/Plugins/.

The next time you open Final Cut Pro, the presets will be available in the Audio/Video Settings window.